Bollinger may have laced into Ahmadinejad on several fronts, including his questioning of the Holocaust’s legitimacy, “but then he turned the podium over to him,” Giuliani told Fox News Channel’s Sean Hannity after the much-watched speech was over.

“Even though the president of Columbia introduced him with an insult, he just responded with an insult,” Giuliani added.

“Ahmadinejad comes away from it saying, ‘Sure there are people there that don’t like me and opposed me and booed me, but hey, there were an awful lot of people there that applauded for me, too. So I have some support there.’ ”

He said Ahmadinejad never should have been invited in the first place.

Giuliani’s GOP presidential-race rivals Sen. John McCain and Mitt Romney have taken the same position, although their camps declined comment about Bollinger’s words.

On the Democratic side of the White House race, former Sen. John Edwards praised Bollinger, saying, “I applaud [his] extraordinary critique of Ahmadinejad. President Bollinger stated that one must know thine enemy, and that confronting the mind of evil is essential to defeating it.”

Aides to his primary rivals, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton and Sen. Barack Obama, declined comment on Bollinger’s words. Both candidates have said they wouldn’t have extended the invitation to Ahmadinejad.